Syracuse linebacker Cameron Lynch beloved for virtue before football in hometown of Snellville, Ga.

Snellville, Ga. — At the back of classroom B27 sits a gray supply cabinet with shiny steel handles that displays the legacy of Cameron Lynch. The contents of this cabinet, the only hint of which is a fragment of brown paper protruding from the bottom left corner, are irrelevant, and what's important rests on the outside rather than within — a twist on the remainder of this story.

Thirty-two photographs plaster the front of the cabinet in Ms. Dee Anna Bean's classroom; even more coat the left side. There are boys in lettermen jackets and girls at prom, a couple is hugging and someone else is photobombing. They capture the fun and frivolity and laughter of high school, and the common component is Cameron Lynch.

Cameron and his trademark smile appear in eight of the 32 photos, flashing the infectious personality, kindness and warmth that define him in the eyes of the Brookwood High School community. Sure he was the Class AAAAA Defensive Player of the Year in Georgia, his grin gracing sports sections after guiding the Broncos to a state title, but that's only football, a game he says is nothing more than "throwing a dead pig with air in it and trying to tackle."

The supply cabinet in Ms. Bean's classroom is a shrine to some of her favorite students, and Cameron Lynch is a steady presence from top to bottom. Michael Cohen | mcohen@syracuse.com

The real Cameron is the happy-go-lucky goofball who took a dance class his senior year and walked a coach's son to the bus every day and brought Ms. Bean to tears with a heartfelt inscription on a parting gift before he went to college.

That's the real Cameron, the one Brookwood remembers most.

"He can walk into a room with 15 people and he knows half of them in five minutes," said Mark Crews, his high school football coach. "And he's friends with another five of them five minutes later."

Yet at Syracuse, where Cameron plays outside linebacker and earned a starting spot for the first time this season, his legacy is largely football-based, and his background remains relatively unknown.

So to understand the real Cameron you must walk the halls at Brookwood, visit with the very people that turned out in force to watch him play against Georgia Tech. They provide a glimpse of the man beneath the No. 38 jersey, the star player beloved more for his inner virtue than his on-field vengeance.

'Like a magnet'

Cameron was born to Rhonda Hanley and Sean Lynch in August of 1993, a 9-pound, 4-ounce whopper of a baby who held firm to his plumpness through middle school. In sixth grade he moved with his mother from Fullerton, Calif., to Snellville, Ga., trading surfing and skateboards and BMX bikes for the mudding and manners of life in the suburban south, 25 miles northeast of Atlanta.

The transition was difficult, with life in the south seeming to crawl in contrast to the rapid pace of the West Coast. He grew accustomed to the yes-sir, no-sir culture of Snellville, all the while feeling the subtle strain of life as a black adolescent in Georgia.

But then he met Chloe Cotter, and things just became simpler.

She was in his Spanish class, this slender and athletic redhead with braces, and she knifed through the lingering social stigmas to befriend the "very, very chubby" new kid. Conversations lasted hours, and his love for sports meshed with hers to form a bond that raced toward familial.

"He's one of those people that's like a magnet," Chloe said. "You can't help but want to be his friend."

From middle school on they were inseparable, the rare male/female best-friend pairing that never once bore a romantic interest. Instead they bickered over who was more athletic — Chloe, the competitive gymnast, or Cameron, the stud linebacker — then argued about their levels of coolness.

She admired him for his attentiveness, unbounded in conversations about silly breakups with boys. She loved him for his encouragement, paramount in her decision to pursue diving after an injury ended her gymnastics career.

Cameron even agreed to take Theatre Dance with her during their senior year, enlisting some of his football teammates to join as well. He stands front and center in a YouTube clip of the hip hop routine the class performed in the fall of 2010, shimmying and sliding in a red baseball cap, Chloe of course by his side.

At one point he does a backflip. At several points he smiles.

"We'll be friends until we die," Cameron said.

Theirs was a peculiar pairing, the future college linebacker constantly flanked by a self-described "tiny little white girl following him around," but it was perfect, and it was safe.

To this day he is the only man besides her father to see Chloe cry.

'Dragons or whatever'

The winding road originates in the back of the parking lot at Brookwood and meanders past a softball field and tennis courts before arriving at the fieldhouse. Here, inside a proud, one-story building with trophies in the windows and the words "The fieldhouse that hope built" printed out front, are further indications of Cameron's greatness.

In the foyer, which has brick floors and a secretary known affectionately as Miss Ann, a poster commemorates the 2010 state championship. It's a title that would never have been won without Cameron, who made 188 tackles that season, and his smile shines brightest from his spot in the third row of the team photo.

His face is on the wall again inside the office of head coach Mark Crews, this time in a framed article from the Gwinnett Daily Post that named Cameron the Defensive Player of the Year.

"I don't know how many positive things you can say about him," Crews said, "but he fits the bill on all of them."

Yet it's down the hallway in an auxiliary room on the right that the most positive thing about Cameron is said. It comes from David Nelson, a physics teacher who moonlights as an assistant football coach, and in a raspy voice he shares off-the-field memories about Cameron that reflect the core values his parents worked hard to instill.

He talks of Cameron the AP Physics student, an attentive and enthusiastic learner who participated in discussions and always asked questions. He talks of Cameron the peer leader, a prime model of how to fuse athletics and academics into one overly successful package.

But most importantly he talks of Cameron the guardian, the teenager who was so mature and responsible that Nelson trusted him with his son, J.T. Every morning Cameron would swing by Nelson's classroom to scoop up the first grader, and together they would walk to the bus stop while discussing "whatever he was talking about at the time, dragons or whatever it may be."

To J.T., Cameron was the coolest of sentries. He had the town's star football player as a personal protector for 15 minutes each day.

When Cameron was unavailable he sent his girlfriend, because no matter what J.T. had to catch the bus. And Cameron refused to let him walk on his own.

"For somebody, for a coach to look at me and say, 'Hey, I trust you to walk my son there,'" Cameron begins, stopping mid-thought to find the right words. "It was like a little family."

Three years later, Nelson is still one of the first people Cameron calls whenever he returns to the Atlanta area. He thanks Nelson again for the AP Physics class that led him to study engineering at Syracuse, but more importantly Cameron calls to check on his little buddy J.T.

"He always asks how J.T. is doing and is quick to see what he's up to," Nelson said. "I really appreciate that. He's one of J.T.'s favorite players."

'In a heartbeat'

Back in classroom B27 is a poster that explains how the friendship between Cameron and Ms. Bean blossomed from nothing to nurturing. It hangs behind her desk, a few feet to the left of the supply cabinet, and it shows a big, brown dog resting its big, brown head on top of a cozy, gray cat.

The text reads: If you want a friend, be a friend.

And in the spring of his junior year, when Cameron saw some of his older and graduated friends write Ms. Bean heartfelt messages on Facebook, he decided to be a friend. Having never met or spoken to her before, Cameron decided to reach out: "I don't know you, but I love you too," he wrote. "I've heard you're wonderful."

She had to meet him.

Cameron Lynch (right), Chloe Cotter (center) and several other Brookwood football players formed the crew that spent all of its free time in Ms. Bean's classroom.Michael Cohen | mcohen@syracuse.com

So Cameron came to the classroom, the one with multicolored and flower-printed rugs, balloons behind Ms. Bean's desk, a strong smell of cinnamon wafting through the air, and he never left.

He found the perfect friend.

Ms. Bean played the role of tutor — she guided Cameron through the first few weeks of Calculus by sharpening his pre-Calculus skills — and secondary mother — she brought in homemade baked goods every Friday — so well that Cameron found himself visiting room B27 as many as four times per day. He transferred into her fourth-period guided study, joining Chloe and a handful of football teammates, which produced the majority of the Kodak moments that are now taped to the gray supply cabinet.

It's the closest she's ever been to a group of students, and she admits that's not likely to change any time soon. Not without another Cameron.

"Ms. Bean is probably the sweetest lady you will ever meet," Cameron said. "You could go to Ms. Bean's class and talk about anything, whether it be girls, school or helping me with homework. That was always a good place to go."

His loyalty was matched by hers, and Ms. Bean attended every football game that season before stopping by every post-game dinner at IHOP on Scenic Highway. She screamed her head off from the 40-yard line of the Georgia Dome during the state championship, and Brookwood's victory validated her efforts to decorate the entire hallway outside her classroom in the days leading up to kickoff.

After graduation, she took her favorite crew of students bowling. Then she hosted a pool party and a cookout.

But before it all could end, Cameron brought her to tears. He had stopped by Ms. Bean's favorite jewelry store, Charming Charlie, and picked up a gift card to express his appreciation for the teacher he had come to adore.

And on the card he scrawled a message that solidified their bond: Ms. Bean you are one of the top three ladies in my life. My mom, my grandmother and then you would be next.

Even now, three years later, Ms. Bean chokes up at the memory. She may have never been his teacher, but he was unquestionably one of her own.

"I would adopt him in a heartbeat."

Cameron Lynch and Chloe Cotter shared a few minutes together after Syracuse's game against Georgia Tech. It was the first time they had seen each other in 10 months. Photo courtesy of Chloe Cotter

'Those are my people'

Cameron's cell phone buzzed and his Facebook page hummed as Oct. 19 drew closer. The move to the Atlantic Coast Conference meant Syracuse would play Georgia Tech, which meant one of Brookwood's favorite sons was coming home.

They descended upon Atlanta in droves, former teammates and teachers and classmates and friends all seeking seats in Bobby Dodd Stadium to watch Cameron play once more. A block of 20 tickets wasn't enough, and by kickoff there were roughly three dozen people with their eyes fixated on No. 38.

So when Cameron took the field that day his gaze wandered through the crowd. He saw Coach Nelson, the man who guided him toward engineering and whose son he walked to the bus each morning. He found Ms. Bean, the teacher whose classroom became his second home. He spotted Chloe, his first and most faithful friend, proudly displaying a handmade sign that read "The Cotters ♥ #38."

"Those are my people right there," Cameron said.

And though they had come to watch him play football, his smile is what they stayed to see. For a half hour after the game they lingered, reminiscing amid laughter and love and turning the walkway outside Bobby Dodd Stadium into a scene from Ms. Bean's classroom.